I foresee centuries
of shell-shocked saints,
with that glazed, awed,
gaze of the saved,
wandering in paradise,
newly attuned to heavens harmonies,
amazed by the glowing glory of rainbow colors
never imagined before,
emanating from the

Divinity

at its core,

the once-lost-now-found,
circumnavigating around and around
needing millennium after millennium

merely
to begin
to absorb
the miracle:

This
will ever be their new abode.

And when,
at last,
the realization:

-Faith has become
the brick and mortar
of the Holy City-

takes hold,

Figures step forward.
.
Shimmering liquid bodies
incarnate in sparkling air,
the scars of their travails
revealed in evaporating mists.

Solid,
now,
they smile,
greet the new arrivals
in the glossolalia of Heaven,

“Stratsvuycha!”

(for, yes, there will be some Russians there)

and Nepal sherpas
and Inuit carvers

who intuit the meaning of the greeting,
recognize their Greeters
and, with the shy, wondering obeisance
of new kids in the neighborhood,
bow to the Originators of their Faiths,
their Redeemers in the Flesh,

who pronounce, in a whisper so explosive
it rocks the cosmos,

“It is good!
Let your eternities
begin!”